American settlement
Miami was still largely uninhabited in the late 1800s, even following the 1857 cessation of hostilities with the Seminole tribe (the only Native American tribe to never officially surrender or sign a treaty with the U.S. government). In 1891, a woman named Julia Tuttle purchased an enormous citrus plantation in the area. She initially pressured railroad magnate Henry Flagler to expand his rail line, the Florida East Coast Railroad southward to the area.
In 1894, however, Florida was struck by a terrible winter that destroyed virtually all of the citrus crop in the northern half of the state. Fortunately, unlike the rest of the state, Miami was unaffected, and Tuttle's citrus became the only citrus on the market that year. She wrote to Flagler again, persuading him to visit the area and see it for himself: he did so, and concluded at the end of his first day that the area was ripe for expansion.
On July 28, 1896, the City of Miami was incorporated with 344 citizens (243 of which were identified as white and 181 as black).
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